by Pip Bird
Winning!
You and your BFF giggle all day!
Farts.
If you could have a superpower, what would it be? You’d rather be a celebrity!
Flying, so you could SAVE people from DANGER.
You would give super hugs to make everyone you met super happy.
Invisibility, so you could sneakily eat as many doughnuts and treats as you wanted.
Answers: If you got …
Mostly As: Just like STAR, you love the limelight and live your life to be as fabulous as possible.
Mostly Bs: You and BRAVE are made for each other. You’re always up for a challenge!
Mostly Cs: It’s hard to imagine anyone as loving and giving as PRINCESS, but that’s you. You’re kind and are always looking out for your friends.
Mostly Ds: Were you ever in any doubt? Your UBFF is DAVE. You’re funny, friendly, and completely true to yourself, no matter what the situation.
UNICORN JOKES
Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
U.
U who?
Unicorn!
Which unicorn smells?
The poo–nicorn
Which unicorn trains the hardest?
The choo-choo-nicorn
What is a unicorn’s favorite type of story?
A fairy tail
What do you call a unicorn without a horn?
Pointless
Where do sick unicorns go?
The horsepital
What’s a unicorn’s favorite hairstyle?
A ponytail
Dave and Mira’s adventures are far from over! Everyone’s favorite unicorn best friends tackle sports in Dave the Unicorn: Team Spirit.
Read on for a sneak peek!
CHAPTER ONE
Back to Unicorn School
Mira Desai had been in the kitchen since five A.M. doing her homework.
Usually this would be a very strange thing to do, but Mira’s homework was for Unicorn School and was much more fun than normal homework, so she wanted to spend every spare moment she had on it. The students had been asked to make a present for their unicorn, and Mira had thought of the PERFECT present for her unicorn, Dave. She was making him a lunch box. Dave loved lunch. And breakfast … and dinner!
Dave wasn’t everyone’s idea of the perfect unicorn—and he wasn’t what Mira had been expecting when she’d dreamed of going to Unicorn School. He was plump, with stumpy little legs and a mane like straw that stuck up in all directions. And Dave was a little naughty. And lazy. And greedy. But NO ONE could make Mira laugh like Dave could—AND he was her UBFF (Unicorn Best Friend Forever). Nothing could change that.
Right now she was decorating the special lunch box with pictures of all the fun they’d had on her last trip to Unicorn School.
Mira was just writing Dave’s name in glitter when her sister, Rani, joined her in the kitchen. Rani was two years older than Mira and also went to Unicorn School. She was in Class Yellow, while Mira was in Class Red. (The classes went up through all the colors of the rainbow.) Rani’s unicorn was named Angelica, and Rani always went on and on about how special and sparkly she was and how they’d won lots of medals. Rani laid a piece of paper on the table and put her fluffy pencil case next to it. She was making a poster to go on Angelica’s stall door. She started carefully drawing her unicorn with a gel pen.
“I’m just drawing a picture of the time Angelica and I won THREE medals in ONE DAY,” Rani announced.
Mira looked at the side of the lunch box. She had stuck on a picture of the time Dave had eaten three cakes in one minute.
“What’s that?” said Rani, leaning over. “It looks like a blob eating some other blobs. And why have you drawn a rat?”
“That’s ME,” said Mira angrily.
Rani continued, “It’s actually easier for you, you know. Everyone is SO jealous of me having a perfect unicorn. But no one would want your unicorn—everyone knows he’s the naughtiest, awfulest unicorn in the world.”
Mira shook her head. Rani had no idea about the adventures she’d had with Dave. They’d made it all the way through the Fearsome Forest AND
performed a daring rescue on the Mystical Danger Cliff. Mira turned to her sister. “Awfulest isn’t a word,” she said.
They kept drawing in silence. A little later, Mira and Rani’s mom and dad came downstairs. “It’s so wonderful that they have this experience to share,” said Dad.
Then Mira grabbed Rani’s pink gel pen and Rani put Mira in a headlock, so Mom had to separate them. She told them to get their bags and get in the car—it was time to go back to Unicorn School!
* * *
Mira was so excited that she could hardly keep still as they drove to the Magic Portal that would take them back to Unicorn School. It wasn’t just that she would get to see Dave, but she’d also get to see her new Unicorn School friends Darcy and Raheem, too. The three of them had become great friends in their first semester at Unicorn School, when they’d all gone on a special quest to rescue their classmates.
Mom’s car pulled up in the rec center parking lot, and the two girls immediately leaped out and ran over to the bush that hid the Magic Portal. Mom followed behind, carrying their bags, their homework, and one of Mira’s shoes.
“You might need these!” she said.
“Thanks, Mom,” said Mira, as Rani jumped up and down, impatient to go into the portal. Mira’s hands were shaking, and she almost couldn’t tie the laces on her sneakers. Mira had gotten brand-new glitter sneakers for her birthday from her parents. She LOVED them, and she couldn’t wait to show them to Dave. (Even though Rani said Mira had copied her, since Rani had gotten her glitter sneakers first.)
After hugging Mom goodbye and taking the obligatory “off to school” photo, the two sisters crawled into the bush toward a patch of shimmering light. And after Rani told Mira to “stop hogging the portal,” they reached out toward the sparkles and tumbled forward, into what felt like thin air. It had only been a few weeks since Mira had last done this, but she’d forgotten how fast it was! It was like going down the big slide at a water park, but with air whooshing around you and rainbow lights whizzing past. Mira and Rani giggled and held on to each other as they shot through the air and landed with a soft thump on the Landing Haystack, in front of the Great Hall.
“Bye!” said Rani, running off.
“MIRA!” came a shriek, and Mira turned to see Darcy. Darcy shouted, “Woo-hoo!” and fluffed her big curly hair, then gave Mira a jazz-hand high five. Raheem was behind her, looking a little anxious as he always did, but pleased to see Mira.
“We’ve been waiting for you to arrive before we go and get our unicorns!” Raheem said, grinning.
That gave Mira a happy, warm feeling inside. Although she had friends in the real world, it was so nice to have special friends at Unicorn School to share lots of adventures with! The three friends started to talk about the presents they had made for their unicorns.
“I made this for Brave,” said Raheem. “I’m a little worried he won’t like it.” And he held up a red cape with a blue felt B sewn onto it.
“He will love that, Raheem—it’s so cool!” Mira said.
“I got Star a wig so that we can have matching hair,” said Darcy.
As they approached the Grand Paddock, they heard a loud neigh and the thundering of hooves. Raheem’s unicorn, Brave, was galloping toward them. Raheem instinctively dived behind a trough just as Brave skidded to a halt. Brave was confused for a moment, but then Raheem quickly crawled out and gave him a hug. Mira was right—Brave LOVED the gift. Raheem put it on him, and Brave stomped around, striking superhero poses.
Darcy and her unicorn, Star, were busy taking selfies with their matching hair. Mira looked around for Dave, until she saw a very familiar unicorn butt poking out from the fence surrounding the stables. Dave had gotten stuck in the fence trying to get to a pile of apples stacked outside the cafeteria. When he heard Mira call his name, he whinn
ied. So Mira ran over. She tried pulling his legs to help get him out, but he remained stuck in the fence. She climbed over and gave him a shove from the other side.
With a loud POP, Dave came free from the fence and fell backward, knocking over a unicorn who’d been walking past.
“Sorry!” called Mira, as the unicorn picked herself up, tutted at Dave, and trotted away.
Mira turned back to her unicorn, who was trotting straight back toward the gap in the fence, eyeing the apples hungrily.
“Wait—Dave, I got you something!” said Mira, pulling the lunch box out of her bag.
Dave’s eyes went wide and he gave a happy grunt. He was even more delighted when he nudged the lid off with his nose and saw that Mira had filled the lunch box with doughnuts. He scarfed them down immediately, just as Mira had expected he would, but he did a little trick of bouncing each doughnut on his nose before catching it in his mouth, which made Mira laugh.
“I don’t think people realize how clever you are,” said Mira, scratching behind his ears. Being back at Unicorn School was …
Dave the Unicorn: Team Spirit is out now, wherever books are sold! And keep an eye out for book three, Dave the Unicorn: Dance Party!
About the Author
Pip Bird is a children’s author living in London. When she’s not writing magical stories, she dreams of going to Unicorn School and having her own unicorn best friend. You can sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Map
Chapter One: Magic Monday
Chapter Two: Through the Portal
Chapter Three: Unicorn Best Friend Forever!
Chapter Four: Dave’s Doughnuts
Chapter Five: History Comes Alive …
Chapter Six: Perfect Prancing
Chapter Seven: An Unexpected Quest
Chapter Eight: The Fearsome Forest
Chapter Nine: To the Rescue!
Chapter Ten: Party Time
Who is your Unicorn Best Friend Forever (UBFF)?
Unicorn Jokes
Excerpt: Dave the Unicorn: Team Spirit
About the Author
Copyright
Text copyright © 2019 by Egmont UK Ltd. Illustrations copyright © 2019 by David O’Connell.
A part of Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC
120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271
mackids.com
All rights reserved
Books are special, books are smart;
Their words are poetry, their pictures art.
So if this book be stolen, or its pages torn,
The culprit shall never in their life see a unicorn!
Library of Congress Control Number: 2019949436
Our eBooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at (800) 221-7945 ext. 5442 or by email at [email protected].
Special thanks to Liz Bankes and Rebecca Lewis-Oakes
Imprint logo designed by Amanda Spielman
Originally published in Great Britain by Egmont UK Limited in 2019
First American hardcover edition, 2020
eBook edition, June 2020
eISBN 9781250256355